Wednesday, October 18, 2006

This channel infuriates me. Garth Marenghi has finally arrived on DVD (or DeanVD as the case says, hehe!) after about 3 years waiting. This is a hilarious show and anyone who doesn't think so is clearly an idiot. When it was on Channel 4 the advertising for it was woeful but it has enjoyed massive success as a cult show since its airing. On Friday night on Channel 4 is a spin-off series called 'Man to Man with Dean Learner' which looks great too, what little has appeared of it.

It's another terrible advertising campaign by C4, the only intelligent thing they've done is release the Garth Marenghi DVD to coincide with it. So why am I so upset?

The IT crowd.At best this show can be described as 'Watchable'. It has some comic genius in there, including Chris Morris (who did the amazing Day Today and Brass Eye shows) and Richard Ayoade (Nathan Barley, Mighty Boosh, and the indescribably ace Garth Marenghi's Dark Place_. But the show itself is just OK. But C4 advertised it like it was the funniest show that would ever grace the Earth. It was advertised in between every show, on the London Underground, Billboards and hoardings. It was ridiculous. In the 80s it probably would have been an OK show because sitcoms with lame and obvious jokes were popular then, and it is done very well. It just isn't very clever or funny. If it was set in the 80s even, that would be something! But the stereotype it plays on is so hopelessly out of date that it just doesn't work.

So. In much the same way that I pray for the day when lazy, talentless Hollywood directors remake crap films, instead of 'remaking' (for remaking see despoiling) classics (Nicholas cage in the Wicker Man? Are you fucking insane?! Why are you remaking perfection you toad?!), I want Channel 4 to advertise the good stuff and ignore the stuff that is just 'OK'.

Won't happen. On the plus side it means I got the Marenghi series for a mere 12 quid. Every Cloud.

Please buy this, borrow it from a friend with taste - anything! Anything with lines like this: "I'm one of the few people who's written more books than he's read" - Garth Marenghi, and episode names like "Skippy the Eye Child" deserves a place in anyone's collection.